


Confluence

by Siver



Category: ISLANDS: non-places
Genre: Experimental Style, Gen, Surreal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-18
Updated: 2020-09-18
Packaged: 2021-03-05 06:42:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,123
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25410109
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Siver/pseuds/Siver
Summary: Be carried up. Share company. Share music. Begin again
Comments: 1
Kudos: 5
Collections: Press Start VI





	Confluence

**Author's Note:**

  * For [faceofstone](https://archiveofourown.org/users/faceofstone/gifts).



The escalator carries the quiet crowd upward. Fronds gently sway in the breeze of their passing. To each tree, their thoughts are their own, unknown and unspoken. If there is a shared purpose beyond this climb, it is a secret held between them, perhaps only whispered and passed from one to the next

through trunk and

down through

d  
a  
n  
g  
l  
i  
n  
g  
**root.**

Such secrets, if that they are, hold nothing for the lone stranger among them, if indeed any meaning can be found in the _susurrus_ surrounding them. Their whispers mingle with the low hum of machinery as they climb up, up and up.

As the whispering wood wavers and flows beyond understanding, so too does the voice rising above the low sounds. Lone phrases join this quiet dance of sound.

“I’ll be late.”

There is no lateness here. There is only presence of the moment and the climb.

“They’re everywhere again.”

They are here and there. They are all and they are one.

“I can hardly move.”

Hold one’s place. Let your roots s p r e a d and all places may be yours to touch.

The stage is reached and the next climb will wait. They fill the area as silent columns, watchers waiting for… something. The stranger leaves, passing out of their notice in the blink of a second’s space, hardly noticed and now gone. Passed out of long memory and forgotten as all the smallest things are.

Something remains.

At the final step the forgotten briefcase buckles and teeters. The stairway is halted, s _h_ u _d_ d _e_ r _i_ n _g._ Nothing may stop the stair’s rise and it will not allow this intrusion for long. It fights against this foreign object like grit in a cog and then with a last grinding creak that sends fronds shivering through the landing, the case

_Tips_

_Tips_

_Tips_

and

f  
a  
l  
l  
s

The escalator is free to continue round and round in its eternal cycle. The trees are now joined by another. From a gaping maw the white object rolls, leaving the case.

Alone.

The egg knows only wheels and shelters in dark places among its fellows, each alike in every way. The egg has known no solitude before now. It was one among the crowd and every journey was exactly as the one before and the one ahead until the sudden

**Stop.**

Wavering, shaking, jostling and then it slipped. P a r t i n g. . . The others passed out of sight.

T  
u  
m  
b  
l  
i  
n  
g

Landing.

A soft place. Somehow the egg knows safety in this place that’s like nothing it has known before and the world drifts away into darkness. The egg sleeps.

And the egg Awakens.

This place is new. This has never happened before in the repeated endless journeys: a destination has been reached. Tall columns fill this quiet space. The egg rolls, rolls, rolls and comes to a halt at the base of one such column. Above there is a swaying of gold and green like the dappled lights on a rain soaked street.

The egg waits alone, yet not alone. Never alone here among the trees.

The coconuts nestle under the umbrella of fronds, shaded and protected and witnesses to the dancing lights. One lights up, a sudden flare of gold in the spark and flash of a thought.

Move

To the left To the right

Shake and jostle Jostle and shake

It is almost free It is almost free

Drop

d  
o  
w  
n  
  
d  
o  
w  
n

thock

The trees give no notice as the coconut wobbles and rolls and joins the other that is alike to itself and yet very different. Two now rest at the base of the tree. Two watch the swaying dance above together.

Then the machinery thrums to life. The escalator rises once more, but the pattern is broken for no crowd rides upon its stair this time—only a lone shadowed figure. From this strange new being emerges…

♫ ♪ ♩ Music ♩ ♪ ♫

Notes sound in a steady flow, swirling around this new stage. The machinery’s whirs and hums lay as an undercurrent like the flow of a river taking them on a new journey to new destinations. For now tree, egg and coconut are all linked by song as the figure is carried to the end and steps away from the stair to join the crowd.

Overhead the waves of gold take on a new pattern as one then two and three and four wink out and five, six and seven glow more fiercely as if to make up for their fellows’ absence. They slowly fade and one through four flare back into life. One half, then the other and back and forth and back and forth into a waltz accompanied by the stranger’s music.

Egg and coconut are joined by the stranger and the music rushes and whirls around them into a lively beat complemented by the wind of the fronds above. Light shimmers from the shadow and flares as the music swells. A forest rests now in this small place. They are the sole audience to this concert that plays for those who stay.

One sings.

Two watch.

Many dance.

**Dance**

**Dance** _Dance_

 **Dance** _Dance_ Dance

 _Dance_ Dance

Dance

.  
.  
.

The lights dim and darkness falls. Sound fades...

The stranger seems to shrink on themself and comes to a rest by egg and coconut. They have played their part. It’s time for a different song to take over once more. The escalators begin again; it’s time for the journey to continue.

Three watch.

The trees march on up,  up and onward...

Three remain.

Darkness. All is still.

…

…

…

Hummmm…

WhirRrRrR...

The escalator carries the quiet crowd upward. Fronds gently sway in the breeze of their passing. To each tree, their thoughts are their own, unknown and unspoken. If there is a shared purpose beyond this climb, it is a secret held between them, perhaps only whispered and passed from one to the next

Something is different.

Three wait. Three watch.

The trees share the space between in this briefest of passing. Watch. Sing. Dance.

One destination is found. The journey continues.

All

F  
A  
  
D  
  
E  
  
  
S  
  


Sap flows, sluggish through snow-covered trees under a slate sky. Small animals pass, unmarked by the towering beings that surround them. Leaves slowly turn over, lost in deepest thought. A spell of sleep lies over this quiet land.

The dreamers dream of a warmer place. If one listens ever so closely they might hear the faintest sound ♩

The cycles carries on.

The escalator carries the quiet crowd upward. Fronds gently sway in the breeze of their passing…


End file.
